


Return to Tirion

by HASA_Archivist



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: 2nd Age - Pre-Rings, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-19
Updated: 2015-04-19
Packaged: 2018-03-24 21:14:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3784508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HASA_Archivist/pseuds/HASA_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the beginning of the Second Age, an exiled Noldorin Elf returns.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Return to Tirion

**Author's Note:**

> Note from the HASA Transition Team: This story was originally archived at [HASA](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Henneth_Ann%C3%BBn_Story_Archive), which closed in February 2015. To preserve the archive, we began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in February 2015. We posted announcements about the move, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this author, please contact The HASA Transition Team using the e-mail address on the [HASA collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/hasa/profile).

1.

The gates are dark-streaked with weather,  
The chains gnarled with rust,  
Cold and heavy-laden  
  amid the tall-growing grass  
With six hundred years of frost and rain  
And winds from the distant sea...  
Six hundred years in solitude.

Six hundred years and the key still fits,  
Time-untouched, gold glinting  
Against the thick-gnarled iron, the rust's weight.  
Still it turns,  
With a soft click.

Link by link the unwilling chains  
  clatter to the ground,  
Inch by inch the creaking hinges,  
Shuddering and groaning the heavy-laden gates  
  swinging open inward, so slowly,  
Shuddering and crying the strings drawn near to the breaking  
Of this exiled heart.

2.

Are those voices I hear rising  
  within the gates joyous to greet me?  
So many voices fair and melodious  
  rising merrily and mingling;  
I discern each one of them,  
  recall the owner of each by face and name.  
I stand beyond the threshold  
  silent and still--  
Fearing to intrude.

A band of singers at the open window above  
  is weaving a sweet festival air,  
To the ripple of silver lutes, and my mother--  
I recognize her just by the playing--at the harp.  
A pair of lovers wander in the garden  
  hand in hand;  
They speak in tender whispers,  
  and then they speak no longer with words.

In the workshop the master smith  
  instructs the young apprentice;  
I hear him among the rhythmic beating of the hammers.  
Down in the courtyard the grooms and stable-lads  
  suddenly burst out uproariously laughing;  
I hear my father's laughter among theirs.

And above all those voices a child shouting with glee,  
Running down the steps,  
  black hair streaming.  
 _Mother, father, I am going out to the city,  
To the market-terrace and  
  the crystal streets.  
I won't be gone long, just a little while,  
I will be home  
  before the mingling of the lights._

3.

_Mother, father, I am home,  
  I was not gone long, the light's just fading--_

Upon the path the briar-rose  
  twists and entwines its luxuriant thorns,  
  and the snow of blown petals whirling thick.  
On the steps the grass grows lush,  
  deep like a river, deep-green  
  with six hundred springs  
  of rain and dreams.

The lilac bushes have been spreading wild-flames,  
Their rich branches over-brimming with many thousands of blossoms,  
A full wavering bank of blossoms to hide the walls.  
And there's the proud oak with outspread boughs,  
Well I remember  
  the slender sapling outside my bedroom window:  
Six hundred autumns its leaves withered and fell.  
And everywhere the dark tangled ivy,  
Trailing from the strong-grooved trunks,  
Trailing from the eaves and the windowsills.

No one but the silence answers me,  
  no one but the endless leaves rustling,  
  the scent of verdure, the mirage's shadow.  
Nothing remains  
  of the merriment and the songs  
  and the sweet and passionate voices,  
Only echoes of my footfall and my faltering cries,  
Only echoes in the wind.

4.

O my father,  
My father handsome and brave,  
The smile upon his face playing with the shadows,  
The white steed flying, the laughter, the long gait,  
The strong arms lifting me up high into the air.

My mother's eyes were the blue-grey of storms,  
Lit with gladness, proud and fair.  
She took me by the hand and walked with me,  
  telling me the names of all the trees and flowers.  
She stopped a moment and gazed at me,  
  her long hair windswept;  
She was more beautiful than the description of words.

O my father, O my mother!  
O the craftsmen and the tall youths,  
  the keepers of the arbours and the gardens,  
The singers and the riders,  
The maidens and the gentle lovers,  
So many went out of these gates, so many together,  
And now I alone return.

5.

Lamps of Tirion below me,  
  below this dusty and deserted tower,  
Rising against the gathering twilight,  
  against the heart heavy-laden with mourning.  
Each one a reflected star  
  in a vast pool of stars,  
Each one a reflected long-gone tear.

You who went from this house  
  and from this land,  
You who sinned and suffered,  
  fought and wept,  
You for whom I sinned and suffered,  
  fought and wept,  
You whom I love,  
Now that I am returned home  
  I would have you by my side.

6.

Another pool of lamps against the night,  
Pale and faint against the sky without stars.  
Another city  
  beneath the blackness of a Night black beyond mere night,  
Until the glow of the lamps turned to pyres.

A silver-haired child crouched in the middle of the street,  
Next to two bodies lying cold and crumpled on the pavement,  
Clutching at their lifeless arms and shaking them hard;  
Her keening voice was strange but I understood her.  
 _O my father, O my mother,  
Your eyes are wide open,  
Look at me, I am here.  
Hear me, I am crying and crying,  
I am here, right here.  
O father, mother!  
Why will you not answer me?  
Why will you not wake?_

It was my father that slew the fisherman  
And then the fisherman's wife;  
She'd flung herself blindly at him,  
  her hair loose and flying wild, unarmed;  
She must have gone mad with grief.  
His sword entered her chest  
  and came out the back.

And my father lay only a little distance from them,  
  just down the street,  
His eyes were wide open,  
  staring empty  
  but for the red reflections of flames.  
A small puddle of blood was forming under him,  
Spreading slowly from the spot he'd fallen,  
Pierced with two arrows.

7.

A black-haired child crouched in the hold of the ship,  
Shaking with every toss of the storm,  
With every shout hoarse and angry above,  
The hail thudding against the planks,  
And in every direction the infinite wrathful waves.

Out of the dimness, my mother's face,  
Amid the whirling confusion of torches,  
The mass of faces tumultuous with fear on the shore,  
Her hair loose and drenched with briny spray  
  and her eyes filled with shadows,  
With a knowledge I did not recognize,  
Pleading with strangers.

_Take her with you, please, my lord,  
Take my child in the ship.  
She is so small and slender;  
She'll take so little space  
  in the ship, almost none at all.  
Please, my lord, please be kind,  
She is so young and I fear for her.  
Take care of her, please,  
O you're so kind my lord,  
  I shall never know  
  how to repay your debt;  
O please take care of my child..._

They told me that my mother died  
  at the edge of a snowy precipice,  
That her bones still are lying  
In the icy water, many fathoms down.  
They told me that she kept on repeating  
Just a few sentences, and later  
  just a few words.  
And later, towards the end,  
She could form no more words,  
But she kept on repeating, kept on pleading,  
As if someone who mattered  
Could still hear her.

_Take my child with you my lord, please,  
She is so small and innocent;  
She is so young and I fear for her.  
Please, my lord, please be kind,  
Please take care of my child._

8.

How shall I speak to you,  
Silent stars above me  
  and twinkling pool of lamps below me,  
How shall I tell you  
Of the downfallen, the tortured, the proud,  
Of those who betrayed  
  and those who were betrayed,  
And those who turned from the road?  
How shall I speak  
To the twilight over-brimming with sweet-scented lilac  
  and with deep flowing grass,  
To the halls trailing with ivy and with echoes,  
To you, childhood home, blessed land, deathless land,  
Of those who laboured in the shadow  
  and those who were lost in the shadow,  
How shall I speak of Endorë?  
How shall I speak of the dead?

If I have the words I would speak of them,  
I would tell you so much about them.  
I would tell you that they were beautiful  
  even unto the end,  
I would tell you  
  there was great love within them.  
But the words will not come to me.  
No words left in me  
  but reverberations,  
No words for them  
  in this abandoned house,  
  among Tirion's hills,  
  in this unstained land  
  this childhood home of mine.

9.

Unstained land  
Radiant with the silence of the stars,  
The city glimmering  
  with secret dreams,  
The hills rank upon rank undulating,  
And in the distance the tender cradle  
  of white Pelóri's arms.

The unseen hand that touches gently the tattered curtains,  
The fragrance of lilac and of briar-rose in the evening-breeze  
  in deep verdant spring,  
Pushing aside the curtains and turning the pages  
  of the books still open on the table,  
The brushes and pens lying haphazard where they last fell,  
The walls and pillars dark-green and rustling with strands of ivy,  
The shimmering dust  
  upon the lutes and the lonely harp  
With all their strings broken.

10.

If I have the words  
I would tell you of tears raining  
For the grief of sundering, for all that were lost,  
But not only of tears and of the lost.  
I would tell you of love  
  that flared with the lightning and burned with the grass,  
  love that fell and rose with the white-plumed tides,  
  love that bled into the stony roots of mountains--  
I would even tell you something of joy.

Sirion's waves rolling silver,  
Swelling with the mountain-storm,  
  with each drop of dew upon the plain,  
Carrying Brethil's leaves and petals, the journeying skiff,  
  the boulders crumbling of cliffs and towers,  
  and voices whispering hope, memories, blood,  
Carrying the broken and burnt bodies of the slain out to the blue sea,  
Carrying the music of jubilation and the deep dirges,  
The spring-melt rich with the smell of pine-needles  
  and of high winds,  
Rising from the caverns of the earth, the chasm's mouth,  
From the multitudinous hills draped kingfisher green,  
From Mithrim in the twilight, from the reflections  
  of the calling sun, and the calling moon,  
From the cloud-dappled grassland, bestarr'd with flowers,  
The thunderous passage, manes flying,  
The long days' ride--  
And the traveller came home glad and weary  
  to the city gates awash with the dawn,  
Past the many-spired fortress and the first flash of the fountain,  
Wending with the white-paved lanes,  
Past the fading lamps at market,  
  the women and girls in the gardens,  
The lovers tremulous, lingering still...  
To the rhythmic shouts of the stone-cutters and masons  
  and the answering shouts above,  
To the proud and beautiful lady at the window, her eyes grave,  
Remembering a dead parent or brother or child,  
To thread and shuttle, the sad and sinuous lay,  
The turbulent heart seeking  
  light, glory, and a world to call its own,  
The lonely singer seeking an answer in empty places,  
And the abandoned one that stood defiant upon the road  
  seeking neither pardon nor return;  
No road returned  
  but to Thangorodrim's gate,  
Dark with the tattooing of drums, the trumpets' blare,  
And the crimson glint of the spear  
  as the young warrior marched away  
  without a glance back,  
To the field of blades, to the dragons,  
The sky afire and convulsing with arrows,  
Surrounded upon the knoll  
  with all his comrades dead and the steed beneath him dying,  
And the banner silver and blue  
  stained and in tatters upon the splinter'd staff;  
Or to the slaying of his kinsmen and women  
For a ravaged mid-winter light,  
Once again to death and the making of death,  
But of these deeds I cannot speak and will not sing,  
Only of the distant smoke, seen through bare branches,  
By the glow of stars, always the same stars  
  that shone down on Valinor's songs,  
As the wanderer many days alone in the forest  
  with no hope nor refuge,  
Stopped to gaze with blurred sight  
Upon the footprints behind him, a single uneven row, knee-deep,  
With here and there drops of blood marking the snow--  
While in Tirion's courtyards the lilac and the briar-rose  
  spread and bloomed wild  
White and red.

11.

The song unloosed within me,  
An exile's song of no returning,  
Halting, discordant song,  
Song of Endorë, a marred song,  
Out of the midnight's heart of sorrow.

Those who carried demons upon their shoulders  
  each moment, each step,  
  each lick of the flame, each lash of the soul,  
Yet still went on,  
Those who survived  
  bodies torn and emaciated, haunted, blind  
Yet still went on;  
Those who died in fields and in cities  
  and in unlit underground places,  
Those who died together with all their families  
  and those who died alone,  
Their voices are unloosed within me,  
Flying with the briar-rose blown white and red,  
Sinking with the dust;  
And the voices of Tirion's dreams  
  are rising from all the lamps silver and gold,  
Gathering in the song and receiving it  
In loving reply.

12.

Past the walls and the blowing flowers,  
Past the fallen eaves and gate-stones of my childhood home,  
A soul exiled with no returning  
  reaches forth and descends  
  step by step  
After the unloosed voices, the unloosed song,  
Tentative, unwilling yet, ever further, ever closer  
To the shining pool, the tender and mournful city,  
To the tears and dreams, silver and gold.

I see lights innumerable in the windows,  
I see scenes of gladness  
  and scenes of heartbreak,  
The flashing recognition, the embraces, arms clinging,  
Choked, trying to speak, guilty, pardoned, blameless:  
I see their eyes, all of them,  
  and all their voiceless thoughts.

I see a warrior of many swift fell deeds,  
Lingering fearful and hesitant by a slender gate.  
He lifts his hand to knock, lowers it again--  
 _Surely, surely she would have long been wed..._

I see a girl sitting in the garden,  
Solitary, arms wrapped about her knees.  
The light of the stars  
  is raining down  
Upon her shoulders, and her face wet with shame  
For the wounds of her body,  
For being frail and sad,  
For the nightmares  
Out of the deep ruins of the dungeon  
  beneath Angband, where they found her.  
She remembers so little of the stars, and of the open air.

13.

I see lamps streaming bright, the doors thrown open  
Warm and joyful before the sweet silvery night.  
The vigil ended, she comes running--and stops  
Atop the steps, suddenly  
  motionless, perfectly straight,  
Eyes still searching, one pale hand  
  gripping hard the jamb.

This tall soldier, her son  
Home, a boy no longer,  
Standing living and real upon the path,  
But O the turn of his face--the stricken night,  
The halted step, alone, and his eyes  
  dark, not meeting hers.

_It was the final battle upon the northern plain,  
The night before Thangorodrim fell.  
The enemy desperate, the earth itself  
Writhed in flames, and thrice our standard  
Wavered, but held its ground.  
Father was in the vanguard, the first rank..._

Stumbling, she rushes down the steps,  
To take her child in her arms.  
The words in her ears are broken and faint,  
Not yet the full rending,  
Not yet the anguished cry,  
Not yet the flooding memories  
  of the last parting, from husband and son.

14.

I see a babe asleep in the cradle,  
To the crooning notes of a lullaby.  
Newly arrived, wondrous,  
His father was born of white Gondolin  
  before its fall,  
And his mother of Doriath, teeming, deep-rooted,  
  before its fall.  
And the child was born of the crossing,  
The ocean's passage from lost Beleriand,  
While the waves frolicked, lapping the ship's sides,  
  and the mariners sang.

The newborn infant dreams in the cradle  
Of dancing clouds and gleaming green.  
And in the lullaby's notes, the low caressing tune  
Comes another music stranger and greater:  
The winds of the sky, and the tides of the sea.

15.

All the voices,  
The voices rapt and eloquent of the dead whisper to me,  
The infinite outpouring music of the living washes over me,  
The radiant subtle silence of the last stars and the first dawn  
  calls before me.

In the mingling of innumerable lights,  
I see a child  
Running and skipping, shouting with glee,  
Out from these gates heavy and dark-streaked with weather,  
Black hair flying.

Take my hand mother, take my hand father,  
Come with me to the city, the stairs of jasper  
  and the crystal streets,  
Come quick, tell me the names  
Of all the trees and flowers, and all the marvels  
Of Tirion the Bright, snow-fair,  
Sorrowless city.

16.

Let go the proud visions,  
Let go the flowing and ebbing song of grief,  
The lonely question shouted from the shadows,  
And the replies whisper'd of the deathless hills.

I am with the forsaken and the lost,  
I am with those with low-bowed heads,  
I am with those who still are dreaming and wandering.

Never to return, yet ever returning,  
  my voice cries unto thee  
Childhood home, and the home of those I love,  
With the pool of tears glimmering, fading,  
With the endless wind bringing the sunrise from the distant sea,  
With the leaves verdant,  
With the briar-rose entwined and the lilac fragrant upon the air,  
In profusion  
  white and red flying,

In Tirion's splendid spring.


End file.
